Do errors in the GHQ-12 response options matter?

Background: The twelve item General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-12) is a widely used measure of psychological wellbeing. Because there are seven different sets of response options across the twelve items, there is scope for transcription errors to occur when researchers assemble their study materials. The impact of such errors might be more important if they occur in the first set of response options than if they occur later in the questionnaire, once participants have become aware that options to the right of the GHQ-12 response sets always indicate worse wellbeing.

Sarin exposure, mortality and cancer incidence in UK military veterans involved in human experiments at Porton Down: 52-year follow-up.

Objectives: We investigated whether UK military personnel exposed to sarin during the 'Service Volunteer Programme' at Porton Down had increased rates of mortality or cancer incidence over a 52-year follow-up.

Methods: A historical cohort study assembled from UK military records, comprising male veterans exposed to sarin during the 'Service Volunteer Programme' at Porton Down, UK (n=2975) and a comparison group of similar veterans who did not attend (n=2919). Mortality and cancer incidence data were obtained from national registries up to December 2019.

Sickness absence and associations with sociodemographic factors, health risk behaviours, occupational stressors and adverse mental health in 40,343 UK police employees.

Aims: Police employees may experience high levels of stress due to the challenging nature of their work which can then lead to sickness absence. To date, there has been limited research on sickness absence in the police. This exploratory analysis investigated sickness absence in UK police employees.

School-based promotion of physical literacy: a scoping review.

Introduction: The role of physical activity in children's healthy development is undisputed, with school-based interventions being seen as a priority. The promotion of physical literacy (PL) seems to be promising due to its holistic approach, combining physical, cognitive, and affective domains. To develop recommendations for possible measures, we compiled existing literature on existing school-based PL interventions.

Ethnic inequalities among NHS staff in England: workplace experiences during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Objectives: This study aims to determine how workplace experiences of National Health Service (NHS) staff varied by ethnicity during the COVID-19 pandemic and how these experiences are associated with mental and physical health at the time of the study.

Methods: An online Inequalities Survey was conducted by the Tackling Inequalities and Discrimination Experiences in Health Services study in collaboration with NHS CHECK. This Inequalities Survey collected measures relating to workplace experiences (such as personal protective equipment (PPE), risk assessments, redeployments and discrimination) as well as mental health (Patient Health Questionnaire (PHQ-9), Generalised Anxiety Disorder 7 (GAD-7)), and physical health (PHQ-15) from NHS staff working in the 18 trusts participating with the NHS CHECK study between February and October 2021 (N=4622).

Health Scares: Tracing Their Nature, Growth and Spread.

Background: Health scares are highly publicised threats to health that increase public concern and protective behaviours but are later shown to be unfounded. Although health scares have become more common in recent times, they have received very little research attention. This is despite the fact that health scares often have negative outcomes for individuals and community by affecting health behaviours and causing high levels of often unnecessary anxiety.

Ensuring Networks Work Well: Development of a Self-evaluation Tool for Network Quality in Community Health Promotion.

Background: Networks are an essential component of community-based health research. Community-based networks require a high degree of collaboration, and the quality of this collaboration is a key factor for intervention success. As such, it is important to measure collaboration quality through network evaluation.

BMI Z-Score (SDS) versus Calculated Body Fat Percentage: Association with Cardiometabolic Risk Factors in Obese Children and Adolescents.

Introduction: BMI or BMI-standardized deviation score (SDS) in children and adolescents is still the standard for weight classification. [BMJ. 2019;366:4293] developed a formula to calculate body fat percentage (%BF) based on age, sex, height, weight, and ethnicity.

Health and well-being of serving and ex-serving UK Armed Forces personnel: protocol for the fourth phase of a longitudinal cohort study.

Introduction: This is the fourth phase of a longitudinal cohort study (2022-2023) to investigate the health and well-being of UK serving (Regulars and Reservists) and ex-serving personnel (veterans) who served during the era of the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts. The cohort was established in 2003 and has collected data over three previous phases including Phase 1 (2004-2006), Phase 2 (2007-2009) and Phase 3 (2014-2016).

Methods And Analysis: Participants are eligible to take part if they completed the King's Centre for Military Health Research Health and Wellbeing Cohort Study at Phase 3 (2014-2016) and consented to be recontacted (N=7608).

Definitions and assessments of physical literacy among children and youth: a scoping review.

Background: Despite the recognised health benefits of physical activity, the physical activity levels of children and adolescents continue to decline. The concept of physical literacy (PL) is a promising holistic approach to physical activity promotion that addresses affective and cognitive domains in addition to physical and motor domains. In Germany, however, no uniform or widely used method exists for assessing PL in children.

Moral Injuries in Healthcare Workers: What Causes Them and What to Do About Them?

Moral injury (MI) refers to the persisting distress which may occur following exposure to potentially morally injurious events (PMIEs). The COVID-19 pandemic has drawn attention to MI in healthcare workers, who have been found to experience more frequent PMIEs in their day-to-day work than those in other occupational groups such as the military. These events may occur on an individual, team, organizational or system level and have been associated with increased clinician burnout and distress, and poor psychological wellbeing.

Anomalies in the review process and interpretation of the evidence in the NICE guideline for chronic fatigue syndrome and myalgic encephalomyelitis.

Chronic fatigue syndrome/myalgic encephalomyelitis (CFS/ME) is a disabling long-term condition of unknown cause. The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) published a guideline in 2021 that highlighted the seriousness of the condition, but also recommended that graded exercise therapy (GET) should not be used and cognitive-behavioural therapy should only be used to manage symptoms and reduce distress, not to aid recovery. This U-turn in recommendations from the previous 2007 guideline is controversial.

Normal and Aberrant Methyltransferase Activities Give Insights into the Final Steps of Dynemicin A Biosynthesis.

The naturally occurring enediynes are notable for their complex structures, potent DNA cleaving ability, and emerging usefulness in cancer chemotherapy. They can be classified into three distinct structural families, but all are thought to originate from a common linear C-heptaene. Dynemicin A (DYN) is the paradigm member of anthraquinone-fused enediynes, one of the three main classes and exceptional among them for derivation of both its enediyne and anthraquinone portions from this same early biosynthetic building block.

What next for student mental health?

When I became President of the UK Royal College of Psychiatrists, I rashly promised to visit every UK medical school to talk with students about mental health. In this article, I share my impressions after concluding this 'grand tour' and ponder the dangers of creating the false impression that universities are 'toxic' for mental health.

Primary Care Consultations Among UK Police Officers and Staff: Links With Adverse Mental Health and Job Strain.

Objective: The current study examined links between adverse mental health, job strain, and likelihood and frequency of primary care consultations among police employees.

Methods: We conducted secondary data analysis on the Airwave Health Monitoring Study data ( n = 33,730). Measures included self-report data on mental health, job strain, job support, and primary care consultations in the past 12 months.

Mental health problems and admissions to hospital for accidents and injuries in the UK military: A data linkage study.

Purpose: Accidents are the most common cause of death among UK military personnel. It is a common misconception in the general public that accidental injuries are always the result of random events, however research suggests that mental health problems and the increased levels of risky behaviour in military personnel may play a role. The objective of this study was to further our understanding of injuries and deaths not related to deployment by examining the associations of mental health, alcohol misuse and smoking with inpatient admission to hospital for accidents and injuries, and attendance to accident and emergency (A&E) departments.

'You get looked at like you're failing': A reflexive thematic analysis of experiences of mental health and wellbeing support for NHS staff.

Staff in the National Health Service (NHS) are under considerable strain, exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic; whilst NHS Trusts provide a variety of health and wellbeing support services, there has been little research investigating staff perceptions of these services. We interviewed 48 healthcare workers from 18 NHS Trusts in England about their experiences of workplace health and wellbeing support during the pandemic. Reflexive thematic analysis identified that perceived stigma around help-seeking, and staffing shortages due to wider socio-political contexts such as austerity, were barriers to using support services.

Development of a German Physical Literacy Assessment for Children in the Context of Health Promotion-An Explorative Approach.

Addressing physical literacy (PL) has become increasingly relevant to counteract sedentary behaviour in children and youth. We developed an assessment tool to measure and evaluate the promotion of individual PL and its four subdomains: motivation and confidence (the affective dimension), physical competence (physical dimension), knowledge and understanding (cognitive dimension), and participation in physical activity. Within this cross-sectional study, we tested 567 children aged 6−12 years from four primary schools that differed in socioeconomic status (SES).